1988 Happy Holidays Barbie Doll

The 1988 Happy Holidays Barbie doll, stock number 1703, opens the Happy Holidays series as its first release, part of the Holiday Barbie line and cataloged in the collector segment. Released in 1988 as a Special Edition, the doll wears a glitter-dusted red tulle gown finished at the waist with a bow of white satin. Her blonde hair is styled long and worn loose over the shoulders, set off by a silvery hair bow, the accessory listed for this release. Because the series is identified by year, reference sources index this doll under the names "1988 Happy Holidays Barbie" and "Happy Holidays 1988." Within this database, the 1989 release, stock number 3523, is the next entry in the series. The record documents a single stock number for this year; years cataloged under two stock numbers appear in this database beginning with 1990. No edition size is recorded for the 1988 release, and no designer is credited in the record; its edition designation is Special Edition, consistent with the years that follow it in this catalog.

Collector notes

As the first doll in the Happy Holidays series, the 1988 release under stock number 1703 is the entry collectors use to anchor a year-by-year run of the line. The record designates it a Special Edition without a stated edition size, and no alternate SKUs are listed for this year. The 1990 through 1993 releases appear in this database under two stock numbers per year, so the single-SKU 1988 and 1989 entries are the simplest in the run to catalog.